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This work shop is a continuation of the workshops already taking place at Dan's Dojo with advance level aikido students and teachers from all over the United States. Dan is making his research into the Japanese arts and the resultant training practices of his private dojo available on a national level. The goal is to offer a workshop in a neutral environment, with an emphasis on learning and understanding internal power and aiki as a basis for martial movement in a global sense, while undertaking the difficult task of taking that first step into personal training and integration of the concepts into your own art.

The work shop will cover introductory basics of the system Dan has developed and taught successfully to hundreds of students and teachers from a wide range of martial arts. Dan will outline the training in such a way as to make the relevancy to martial movement immediate, clear and accessible. Included will be:

• A presentation of how the martial arts take advantage of natural and common postural failures and methods for building a martial body that moves antithetical to the principles most martial arts use as their foundation for defeating the common body frame.

• How the trained body can begin to take care of itself automatically in a live environment.

• An emphasis on specific training tools (solo and paired) to develop internal power, and specifically how it relates to aiki connections in a martial context.

• Creating and maintaining a structure supported on all sides and how to strengthen it with breath training exercises.

The material covered; while benefiting aikido greatly will not be "specific" to just the aiki arts like Aikido and Daito ryu, but any grappling or striking art, so teachers from other disciplines are welcome.

Dress will be sweats or shorts and T-shirts. No Gis, No budo affiliated T-shirts please. This will be very informal, and casual, but I strongly urge you to bring a notebook.

This will be a closed workshop with no pictures, video, or visitors allowed. Participants are required to fill out an application (available by e-mailing Dan @ homeoffice@charter.net ) for further details and to be considered for a spot. People may or may not be accepted by Dan's sole discretion.

Workshop fees are $175.00 for both days, $100.00 for one day on Saturday with no Sunday only training. Fees must be paid in full with your registration.

The schedule:
Saturday 9 AM to 6 PM with a 2 hour break for lunch
Sunday 9 AM, Lunch, until.....with consideration for flights, travel, and condition of the participants.

Please do not direct questions or requests for attendance to Orange County Aiki Kai, which is being gracious with the use of their space while not directly involved in the workshop.

Same question, sent an email a few days ago but no response. Perhaps I didn't include enough background information or I have the wrong email address. Should I try sending a PM?

Hello,
Email is good. I wouldn't send a PM. As I understand it, there's a flood of emails. If you've sent an email to homeoffice@charter.net, then that should get to Dan. Sending background info on yourself is a good idea. If you think the first email might not have reached him for some unexplained reason, send a second. But don't send multiples after that.

Dan is back from being out of state. He said he will send out replies by Friday. (Unless work, family, etc intervene. Everyone knows how that goes.) There are only one or two spots left.

IMO:
If you've been to a Sigman workshop and it seemed familiar, then I would highly encourage you to attend Dan's workshop because Daito ryu aiki is different (I'm NOT saying it's better or worse, just different). How? Go to the workshop and not only feel/experience it, but get answers.

IMO:
If you've been to a Sigman workshop and it seemed familiar, then I would highly encourage you to attend Dan's workshop because Daito ryu aiki is different (I'm NOT saying it's better or worse, just different). How? Go to the workshop and not only feel/experience it, but get answers.

Because you brought it up, apparently to encourage people to ask Dan's permission to attend this workshop (and because you've seen Mike Sigman), please describe how Dan and Mike differ, and how Daito Ryu aiki is different from what you believe that Mike does.

Also, are you saying that Dan is demonstrating and teaching Daito Ryu aiki? If so, how does his Daito Ryu aiki differ from other Daito Ryu approaches (for example, that of Okamoto-sensei)?

I look forward to your reply.

Jim

He had made enough enemies to acquire his nickname, and not enough friends to hear what it was. P. Califia, The Spoiler

As I said, if you have attended Mike's workshops, then I would suggest going to Dan's. Jim, you should go. I think you'd absolutely love this stuff. For everyone else, I highly recommend attending Mike's, Dan's, and Ark's workshops. The similarity and difference can be experienced firsthand. Not saying good or bad but I've found differences. Everyone will. IMO, that's something best experienced directly.

As I said, if you have attended Mike's workshops, then I would suggest going to Dan's. Jim, you should go. I think you'd absolutely love this stuff. For everyone else, I highly recommend attending Mike's, Dan's, and Ark's workshops. The similarity and difference can be experienced firsthand. Not saying good or bad but I've found differences. Everyone will. IMO, that's something best experienced directly.

As I said, if you have attended Mike's workshops, then I would suggest going to Dan's. Mickey, you should go. I think you'd absolutely love this stuff. For everyone else, I highly recommend attending Mike's, Dan's, and Ark's workshops. The similarity and difference can be experienced firsthand. Not saying good or bad but I've found differences. Everyone will. IMO, that's something best experienced directly.

It's smart to keep an open mind and not prejudge.

To the general public:
For all those who haven't been following the long years of Internet discussions back and forth over internal skills/internal power (IS/IP), there are hundreds of pages of Internet posts regarding this subject. None of it has come close to direct first hand experience. Did I find differences? Yes. Will you? Wouldn't it be worth the chance to find out? As I stated above to Mickey, "I highly recommend attending Mike's, Dan's, and Ark's workshops." Not either/or, not just one, but get out and get some experience with them all. Talk to people who have attended them. If you've been smart and kept an open mind, I'm sure people will be open to discussion about it. In the end, though, first hand experience really is the only answer.

To clarify ... these are my *personal* opinions. Please don't associate them with Dan Harden. As Dan has posted, he doesn't teach an organized system, he does MMA. My personal opinion and that of others is that what we have felt/experienced is Daito ryu aiki.

If you are interested in an organized Daito ryu approach, I would highly recommend contacting Howard Popkin of the Roppokai. Great teacher, great person, skilled, open, generous, and well worth knowing.

Some years ago, both Mike and Dan (plus many „followers") were on my ignore list. Then I got hooked on the aiki debates, and followed them closely. Finally, I decided that apparently there was something - either worth finding out, or worth laying to rest for good. So I went to see both of them. It was a great experience. It was worth finding out -- for me.

Did I understand fully what they do? Of course not. Are there differences in what I saw -- of course. Similarities? I venture to say, yes. Did I like some stuff more than other stuff? Sure, anything else would be surprising. Do I know them well? Not at all, I was just a seminar participant.

Most of all, I found both Dan and Mike, when I experienced them as teachers, made an impression on me that was quite different from their internet persona. Much like I probably would myself, or anybody else.

I really regret that I did not make up my mind to go and see a lot earlier. I wasted time reading a lot of writing here on aikiweb that appears in a totally new light when things are experienced first hand. And I delayed meeting two teachers who can be experienced first hand, while siding in my reader's mind with all sorts of speculative opinions and judgements, and opinions and judgements about opinions and judgements, here on aikiweb. What a waste of time.

I still dont get why people who are neither Dan nor Mike themselves need to turn this into some type of pro/con sniping. For me, what they do is neither salvation nor the devil, just incredibly interesting ways to train. And I did not get the impression any of them wanted people to think otherwise.

So if you read all that stuff.... just go and see, its more interesting.